Bios not installed, ASUS P4P800-E deluxe

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The m/c I have was setup with RAID0 array some years ago and the two SATA 160GB drives are good. Thats is WinXP see's the array and all the data is there and it works fine. The boot drive is another 160GB PATA on the Primary IDE Master channel.

HOWEVER

I now want to re-config the RAID array to be a Mirror instead of a Stripe. To do this I have to use the Promise Fast Track 378 Bios utillity to delete my existing array and create a new one. I would backup and restore to an external drive to keep the data. But when I boot the machine I see the same situation as the old post. ie :

"Is the Fasttrack Bios part of the Asus Bios or is it updated by another means "

Fastrack and most other raid, scsi and add in card bios's are separate from the system bios.

I doubt the message no bios installed is correct for diag use. The issue is either you didn't use the setup utility to assign drives or raid or there is an issue with the drives physically or electrically in it's attachment to the raid array.

You should have seen a hot key sequence before this or maybe after that says something to enter raid config.

You have TWO IDE/SATA drive controllers.BOTH of them support RAID arrays.

The Promise controller is the Fastrak controller. It supports more types of RAID arrays, but both drive controllers support RAID 0 and 1

The two IDE headers for the built into the main chipset IDE/SATA controller are next to the floppy data header and ATX power socket. The two SATA headers for that controller are the ones nearest to those IDE headers and are labeled SATA1 and SATA2.

The one IDE header for the Promise Fastrak controller is by itself near the mboard battery .The two SATA headers for the Promise controller are nearest that header, labeled SATA_RAID1 and SATA_RAID2.

"Is the Fasttrack Bios part of the Asus Bios"

The Fastrak's bios is probably within it's controller chip.

Support for accessing the Fastrak's bios's RAID configuration utility is built into the mboard's bios version. The Fastrak's bios must be loaded to use that RAID utility.

If the Promise Fastrak controller is enabled in the mboard's bios settings (it probably is by default), when you boot the computer you always see this first:

If no drives are detected connected to the Promise Fastrak controller, then you see....

"No Drives attached to FastTrak Controller, BIOS Not Installed"

.....and the mboard's bios continues with the boot sequence

That's the bios for the Promise Fastrak controller that the message is about.

There's no need to load the Fastrak's bios if no drives are detected connected to the controller.

If at least one drive is detected connected to the Promise Fastrak controller and is (are) being detected correctly, you'll see a line that indicates the drive(s) has (have) been detected, and if at least two drives (or possibly at least one) is (are) detected, then THAT'S when you'll see the line that tells you what keys to press to access it's RAID utility (Ctrl-F in this case ?); there is a short delay - pause - in the mboard's boot sequence when that line is on the screen.

If you don't respond to that within x (5 ?) seconds, then the mboard's bios continues with the boot sequence......

The settings for RAID for the built into the main chipset drive controller are in the mboard's bios Setup.

The settings for RAID for the Promise Fastrak controller can only be accessed while booting after you see this line..

.... in this case, if the drives in the RAID array are connected to SATA_RAID1 and SATA_RAID2 and are being detected properly

I suspect you have have the SATA drives connected to SATA1 and SATA2, NOT SATA_RAID1 and SATA_RAID2 . .................................................................

If you want the operating system to be on the RAID array....

You must set up the RAID array BEFORE you install an operating system.

If the SATA drives are connected to the built into the main chipset drive controller, they will NOT be detected by the XP CD , unless

- you set the SATA controller mode in the mboard's bios to an IDE compatible mode

- or - if the SATA controller mode is set to SATA or SATA RAID, - you press F6 at the beginning of loading files from the XP CD, and provide the drivers for the main chipset's SATA controller on a floppy disk in a conventional floppy drive- or - you have made yourself a "slipstreamed" CD that has the main chipset's SATA controller drivers integrated into the contents of the XP CD, and use that CD to install Windows.

If you have the SATA drives connected to the Fastrak controller, they will NOT be detected by the XP CD , unless- you press F6 at the beginning of loading files from the XP CD, and provide the drivers for the Promise Fastrak SATA controller on a floppy disk in a conventional floppy drive- or - you have made yourself a "slipstreamed" CD that has the Promise Fastrak SATA controller drivers integrated into the contents of the CD, and use that CD to install Windows.

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